Hey!

There were lots of book conversations this week and the continuation of Mid-Year List O’Clock.

My accomplishment for today was that I did not buy a book and violate my fragile book buying ban. Instead, I asked my library to order it so I and many others could read it. …if I love it I’ll probably still end up buying it, though. And I know if I don’t say what book, people will throw digital tomatoes so in case y’all want to try it or request it for your library: The Feywild Job by C.L. Polk.

A-Side

A Meal of Thorns 54- Sunshine with Laura Zats
This discussion of Sunshine by Robin McKinley was a delightful surprise. Sunshine feels like one of those books that moved through different reading populations like a slow, creeping vine. It might sink with most people but for the few it hit, it hit. Then those readers would carry it forward to new groups, where the process would repeat. It does that rare word-of-mouth spread that keeps it published and successful but not a wild, viral sensation. It’s such a weird, dreamy story, full of world building that alone would fall apart but together is sticky enough that it becomes this mysterious, cohesive wonder. This episode of A Meal of Thorns is a great analysis of the book, its reception, and its place in the field.

The Faith of Beasts by James S.A. Corey
This review by Yoon Ha Lee of The Faith of Beasts, the second book in The Captive’s War series, is an absolute banger. He situates the book in conversation with both older and newer titles as well as human history and gave me a few different historical rabbit holes to go down. I appreciate reviews that make connections between other works that are tackling the same subjects, which is a skill I want to get better at myself. It’s always a treat to find someone doing it well and providing a great example of the practice!

The Great Tolkien Reread: A Journey in the Dark, The Bridge of Khazad-Dûm
This time around, I had two pieces from Abigail to read in her exploration of The Lord of the Rings. The other essay is also good, and a particularly excellent look at Galadriel, but it was this specific essay that has me like, “Wait, maybe I should read these books?” (No one hold their breath, I’m still resisting…) The most memorable part of the films for me was the trip to and through Moria, for obvious Gandalf reasons but also because the vibes of that whole section were excellent. Abigail’s analysis, between her examination of Boromir’s character to the insights about Gandalf were fascinating and cracked open all the imagery from the films in my head. I’m also intrigued by her reading of the series as post-apocalyptic, although someone does disagree in the comments. That would be a neat set of duelling essays to read, though!

Bona Books and genAI / Honey, We Bought an AI Story
I came to this discussion of Bona Books purchasing genAI generated copy via people being unpleasant and smug towards Bona Books, so that definitely changed my perspective on it. As someone with a newsletter who reads a lot, often by people who are new/hobby writers, I really feel for the editors in this case. I can’t pick genAI copy out of a line up and I’m very soft-hearted toward people who get scammed. I try to be careful but I know one day these folks are going to come for written SFF reviewing for whatever reason, even if it’s the most non-monetizable/anti-fame-generating endeavor imaginable. I’m a little better at art/video due to following experts who taught folks what to look for, but the writing “tells” don’t help me at all (and I use them so they can take them from my corpse). It’s a rotten situation all around, but I think it’s much better for us to give small teams grace and solidarity so other teams in the future don’t feel like they can’t be honest due to overly harsh social consequences. As I said on Bluesky, I’m firmly of the opinion that this technology is meant to radically disrupt existing creative communities and fracture them while the technology is cheap and easily accessible. Then there’s less competition later when the tools become even better but prohibitively expensive for most working writers to use.

Reviews/Discussions

Audition by Pip Adam (Abigail Nussbaum @ Asking the Wrong Questions)
Brigands & Breadknives by Travis Baldree (llyzabeth @ Pixelated Geek)
...And Call Me Conrad/This Immortal by Roger Zelazny (Hugo History Podcast)
The City of Brass by S.A. Chakraborty (lexi aka newlynova)
The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami (Stewart Hotston)
Everybody’s Perfect by Jo Walton (Bill Capossere @ FanLit)
Hammajang Luck by Makana Yamamoto (Becky’s Book Reviews)
Hell’s Heart by Alexis Hall (Carrie S. @ Smart Bitches, Trashy Books)
Hothouse by Brian Aldiss (Hugos There Podcast)
The Inn at the Foot of Mount Vengeance by Chiara Bullen (Tammy @ Books, Bones & Buffy)
The Inn at the Foot of Mount Vengeance by Chiara Bullen (T.O. Munro @ Fantasy Reviews)
Jaran by Kate Elliott (Niko’s Book Reviews)
Killswitch Protocol by M.J. Kuhn (Krystle Matar @ Grimdark Magazine)
The Many by Sylvain Neuvel (Niall Harrison @ Locus)
Moon Over Brendle by Jeff Noon (Womble @ Runalong the Shelves)
Moon Over Brendle by Jeff Noon (Paul Di Filippo @ Locus)
Moss’d in Space by Rebecca Thorne (Allie Greene @ The Lesbrary)
Nonesuch by Francis Spufford (Paul March-Russell @ Strange Horizons)
A Parade of Horribles by Matt Dinniman (Dina @ SFF Book Reviews)
A Pirate’s Life for Tea by Rebecca Thorne (Jamie Rose @ The Lesbrary)
The Prey of Gods by Nicky Drayden (Fiction Fans Podcast)
Rabbit Test and Other Stories by Samantha Mills (Jacqueline Nyathi @ Harare Review of Books)
Radiant Star by Ann Leckie (Russell Letson @ Locus)
The Sorcerer of the Wildeeps by Kai Ashante Wilson (Elias @ Bar Cart Bookshelf)
St. Ulphia’s Dead by Scott Lambridis (Robert Welbourn @ Ancillary Review of Books)
Sublimation by Isabel J. Kim (Narrated Podcast)
The Wildcraft Drones by T.K. Rex (Octavia Cade @ Strange Horizons)

B-Side

I have not yet solved the problem of linking to locked pieces that I can unlock for myself to read, but not anyone else. I’m considering an emoji in front of these items, perhaps a 🔒? But I don’t know if the emoji has proper alt text. The struggle! Anyway, all this to say that I read the beginning of Alice Bell’s review of Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman and it introduced me to a) Alice Bell (rad) and b) Jank, and also reminded me that critique online is on life support. I don’t know what it is about this series. I don’t want to study the series (I would have to read them and I’m not convinced that’s a good idea for anyone), I want to study the reaction to this series and why critique is unwelcome in ultra popular viral series spaces.

Most Anticipated Young Adult SFF/H for July & August 2026 is out from Alex Brown. Reactor has another list of upcoming 2026 books to look out for, courtesy of Christina Orlando. Book Riot shared their list of Best Science Fiction Books of the Century (So Far), which is a neat collection, but I would prefer a list with no authors repeated. My excessive and unworkable idea is that such projects are more interesting if lots of different outlets and people all make lists around the same time, for comparison purposes. That’s hard to organize, though. L.D. Lewis, author of Year of the Mer, asked folks for “delightful/weird/delightfully weird story“ recs. In good news for writing about books, Tammy has been blogging for 15 years! Even more good news (if you like Stardew Valley): there’s going to be a Stardew Valley crochet book. Now I can learn to crochet and make 10,000 void chickens.

The Stitch & Bitch crew did their July live show. Lou put together a rec list for July SFF. The Player of Games is watching me from my bookshelf, judging my choices. I read Reviews as Texts from the Ancillary Review of Books round table on reviewing, which gave me a lot to think about, but I’m still mulling it over because what I like to see in reviews changes so often. Niall Harrison shared his favorite books so far in 2026, but I’m begging everyone to Start A Blog, at least for archive purposes, because what if we lose Bluesky like we lost Twitter? 😭

In Hugo finalist coverage, Camestros Felapton reviewed Shroud by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Tchaikovsky is a tease about interspecies friendships. Please take this free idea: brand new alien pals on an adventure to destroy capitalism. Camestros also ranked his Hugo choices (please do not yet ask me about mine, I’m struggling). Stephen Geigen-Miller covered the finalists for Best Graphic Story. Phoebe Barton, who is nominated as part of the Escape Pod team, did an AMA on Reddit. Sandra Newman reviewed Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor in The Guardian.

Although the Hugo Awards are where I put a lot of my time/focus, the Hugo itself is only one award. Even though we do build it collectively, we’re going to miss things because the SFF field is massive now. A few years ago I decided to start looking at awards collectively to get a wider view of what SFF is up to, which anyone can do via this tool on the Science Fiction Awards Database (thanks to the admin of this website for a great resource). To get the books only nominated once or twice (where the niche stuff lives), you’ll have to dig into the lists, but there’s always a chance of finding an interesting title to check out.

I’ve caught up on all my Tolkien readalong content, including the A-Side rec for Abigail’s essays. Roseanna picked her analysis up with the beginning of The Return of the King. She makes me want to print her review out and annotate it, because I have so many thoughts (…I’m going to end up reading these books, aren’t I?). For Tolkien Comedy Hour, Shelved by Genre wrapped up their coverage of The Two Towers as well, and moved on to The Return of the King. And it’s not part of a re-read, but it is Tolkien related, this time about the origin of the Ents in the series and where Tolkien might have been inspired. There are citations!

For even more SFF adventures, check out Wombling Along!

Art recs: And now, a brief word from this account's sponsor by Brooke; The Owl gang by Aled Thompson; angry AI cat by Wynn; painted trees by Sam Hogg; none of my work is done but I am by Koffie Kobold; The Singing Pools by Emily Hare

Outro

Thanks to everyone who submitted link recommendations recently! I have a lot of cool things to explore. This round of additions means I’ve reached the end of my free Inoreader experience (they only give you 150 feeds), so if you know a millionaire, please give them a link to my patreon. In hilarious news, I also only have…three…book recs. At this point, when I get the four I like to run a list, it may cause a singularity. 😂 — Renay

Recent Reading:

(Last) Ode to the Half-Broken by Suzanne Palmer (🥹)
(Now) Moss’d in Space by Rebecca Thorne
(Next) Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor (final Hugo novel!! 🎉)